OPINION: Let the imagination run wild

Tuesday night, I turned on Netflix and watched “Anaconda,” a reboot of the 1997 “Anaconda” (remember Jennifer Lopez, Ice Cube and Jon Voight?), although this time with less diversity (hello Jack Black and Paul Rudd).

“Anaconda” isn’t good. Riding the trend of meta humor (the plot involves a team of indie filmmakers making a fictional reboot of the original “Anaconda”) and recent spiritual sequelboots, so much of “Anaconda” is just referencing industry trends that we’re all sick of. But “Anaconda” isn’t excluded from the trend just because it’s cynical.

Knowing its own existence is ironic, “Anaconda” can’t really sell the idea that “Anaconda” is some beloved masterpiece. This is a film series where the sequel had the subtitle “The Hunt for the Blood Orchid.” It’s a swampy remnant of 2000s horror where cheap thrills ruled.

There’s a big snake. That’s the cultural impact “Anaconda” has had.

But, something about the 2025 “Anaconda” has stuck with me. Like I said, the movie isn’t good, the performances aren’t good, jokes are hit and miss, I do like Steve Zahn but not much else.

You see, 2025 “Anaconda” is about a group of guerilla filmmakers entering the jungle to make a movie with barely any budget. And, even through the cynical lens of the meta humor, the feeling of making something special to only the people involved is captured perfectly.

It’s Jack Black’s character’s birthday party (I forgot his name, but he’s just Jack Black in the movie so I don’t feel too bad). Paul Rudd brings in an old CRT TV with a VHS player, loaded with one of the short films they made in high school called “The Quatch.”

It’s dumb, poorly made and written like a bunch of high schoolers just learned their favorite four-letter words. But it’s full of manic energy that shows how playful and fun it is to work with friends on something dumb. And it’s an emotional experience seeing it again, capturing the time in which it was made. Old friends, younger faces.

Sometimes, a bad movie will have a good scene which itches just right. And in “Anaconda,” a mostly unremarkable movie, the moments I remember are the moments of creativity in the crew’s filmmaking. A big snake does derail everything, but oh well.

In high school, I directed a short film for speech. It’s not very good, I will admit, and I think I knew it wasn’t very good at the time when I submitted it for competitions. The farthest it got was a Division II rating at state.

My film was called “BAIOM,” an acronym for “But Alas, It’s Only Me.” It’s a pretentious story about a crotchety writer who hermits himself in the woods trying to write what he believes to be his redemptive masterpiece.

The writer, at a wooden desk placed in the deep woods, is visited by an impish kid, who bothers and annoys the writer. The two of them have some dialogue where the writer reveals how self-centered he had become in his own isolation, and the kid makes fun of him for thinking so much of himself.

Eventually, the now-humbled writer leaves his writing and scribbles behind at that desk in the woods and leaves the forest. He comes across a grumpy police officer who asks him where he came from. The writer turns around to look for the kid, who is nowhere to be seen. The writer utters the line “He was right here, but alas, it’s only me.”

Like I said, not very good. But at the time, it was my idea that I was so passionate to bring to life, and I worked with my friends and people I haven’t even met properly to make it. We filmed in the freezing cold of January in a winter forest and almost got hypothermia from being outside for filming, but I loved it.

I shot and edited the film, composed some tracks (easily the most embarrassing part of the short as MIDI synths and strings played discordant tunes) and showed it in competition.

I mostly shrunk away from film production due to me losing confidence after actually finishing the short and the fact half my college years were during the pandemic. But, I have old scripts on my laptop and a few solo projects I’m immensely proud of.

I thought the short was lost to time, but I found an old flash drive when I moved to Creston for this job, and found the short in its entirety, alongside the raw footage from shooting. It’s a bittersweet thing to find something so special to me, yet I don’t want to see again.

I haven’t even watched it since I found it. It’s sitting in a folder on my computer at home. It means too much to me, I guess. It’s not like it will hurt me. Maybe some day.

So, seeing that spirit of remembering the old times in “Anaconda,” I can’t help but feel myself getting the old itch to make something of my own and then collaborate with others to make it our own. No matter the budget, no matter the time.

To any students participating in short film, here’s a tip. Make a comedy. Include physical performances and jokes that involve moving around, not just dialogue. Be dynamic with your ideas. Do stunts (within reason, of course). Let your imagination run wild; your friends will catch you.